[1] Helsingborgs IF were the defending champions, having won their fifth Swedish championship and their seventh Allsvenskan title the previous season.
IF Elfsborg won the Swedish championship this season, their sixth one, in the 30th and last round on 4 November 2012 by drawing with Åtvidabergs FF 1–1 at home, and by the only other title contender in the last round Malmö FF losing 2–0 against AIK at the last Allsvenskan match at Råsunda.
The attendance voted Malmö FF as the title favourites with Helsingborgs IF and IFK Göteborg closely after.
Several of the favourite teams got off to a struggling start, reigning champions Helsingborg found themselves in a mid-table position after the first four rounds of fixtures.
Malmö eventually recovered from a poor start of the season to trail Elfsborg eight points below at the time of the Euro break.
One of the early favourite to win the title, IFK Göteborg, were by this period of time positioned 10th in the league table.
Örebro were found at the bottom of the league table at the time of the Euro break having failed to win any of the 12 fixtures being played at that time and only having been able to draw four of the matches, they were now trailing 15th placed GAIS with five points and 13th placed Kalmar with nine points.
At the other end of the Allsvenskan table, it appeared as if both Örebro and GAIS were headed towards Superettan, trailing the 14th team in the league by 11 and 14 points, respectively.
Trelleborgs FF and Halmstads BK were relegated at the end of the 2011 season after finishing in the bottom two places of the table.